13 September 2012

News, Stories and Movies

A movie about Bradley Wiggins?

I've been reading a lot lately, taking in the news about Lance Armstrong and The Repenters (now there is a title for a movie, or a band). I appreciated Joe Lindsey's recent reminder that we are all allowed to form our own opinions but not our own facts. Like many of you, I have been busy finding the facts to support my own opinions, isn't that how this works?

In the end I have discovered - nothing. We already knew this!

Power corrupts

Power and money can buy success

Doping pays

Cheaters point fingers

Each man is responsible for his own behavior

Medical Science advances quickly

The truth will eventually come out

Bad people don't always get their due

Knowledge will give you power, but character earns respect

Journalism exposes truth, courts determine truth

It is not cool to give your time to something only to be deceived

People forgive

Everyone likes a happy ending

Feeling a little foolish that I should have known

My opinions mostly center around certain key ideas. These include 1) we knew much of this a long time ago, but people who lie are motivated to keep a lie going - a long time, 2) this is the tip of the iceberg, after a long lie, increasing degrees of truth come out, 3) doping pays, and 4) even though I knew, I still feel foolish to learn the extent and depth of cheating.

1)Hindsight is 20/20. History makes sense looking back. If you read this conversation between Frankie Andreu and Jonathan Vaughters printed in 2006, you will realize we already knew all this a long time ago, long before Vaughters wrote his NYT confession. But liars wasted our time and made life miserable for those who attempted to tell the truth, destroying careers in their wake. Read: CBS Sports, In-Depth: Cycle of denial: Implicated on the Internet (from 2006).

2) It's only the tip of the iceberg. Be prepared for rolling seas for the next 2-years as some facts are locked-up due to pending court cases and Organization tug-of-wars. This will take some time to shake-out, unless Vaughters continues to out everyone in the name of his No Man is an Island campaign. We also have Vaughters to thank for complicating the course to correction by spreading the level the playing field theory which only served to give the uniformed an easy excuse to latch onto to proclaim that no one did wrong because everyone did wrong. Following this theory two wrongs make a right even when some were more wrong than others. Personal opinions are welcomed, but if you find yourself using the level playing field excuse or the he never tested positive explanation then you haven't read the news since initially making up your mind that you would never accept that Lance Armstrong doped.

3) Money money money. Anyone else frustrated to see dopers making the bucks? They made money then, they paid money, they make money now. They received contracts to race, they received jobs after they raced, they receive money for books written and movies made. Those who did not dope did not. How many people read Gregg Germer's confession that he did not dope? How many people read and paid for The Secret Race, Tyler Hamilton's confession that he did dope?

4) Ignorance was bliss.

Movies have a happy ending

Books may not always have a happy ending or make you feel good, but movies like happy endings. After years of talk about making a movie about Lance Armstrong, his story proved to be a tough one even by Hollywood standards. How quickly we shift gears onto the newest guy on the top of the podium. That guy is Bradley Wiggins. This morning VeloNation.com wrote that Hollywood (the notion that movies come from Hollywood is like saying extra virgin olive oil only comes from Italy - it's a label) is moving forward on a movie about Bradley Wiggins because, “Bradley is a larger-than-life personality and his story really appeals to movie executives.”

Bradley Wiggins is larger than life?

How did I miss this fact? Bradley Wiggins seems like a pretty normal guy to me. He even mentioned his Mom while standing on the podium of the 2012 Tour de France. The only person larger than life in cycling is Mario Cipollini and that is because he has built his (Bond) brand around the image. And maybe The Badger (Bernard Hinault), anyone who at the age of 58, instinctively throws (video) an invading person off the stage at the Tour de France is larger than life, and whose reaction to the entire Lance Armstrong affair also happens to have been, “I couldn't give a damn.”

Does this look like a larger than life individual?

Bradley Wiggins

The news is that British actor Rhys Ifans could play Wiggins in the movie. What do you think?

Rhys Ifans

Rhys Ifans was the zany actor in Notting Hill. The only problem is that Ifans is 45-years old. Anyone want a job as a cycling stunt-man double, and happen to look like Bradley Wiggins and Rhys Ifans?

Rhys Ifans in the movie Notting Hill, or is it Bradley Wiggins?

After a couple weeks of lousy news about our fragile sport of cycling, the hard races up north in Canada and the fun of the Tour of Britain were fairly good distractions. I welcome the World Championships next week, 15-23 September 2012, in Limburg, Netherlands. How can a fan not get excited about riders representing their countries and themselves to really prove who is the fastest on a bike.